Is anyone getting Olympic fever yet? Based on the absolute vacuum of Olympic advertising thus far, I had actually forgotten that they would be held this summer in London. I remember the countdown to Beijing beginning sometime the year before with an actual countdown in the ads – "203 days to the Opening Ceremonies!" Now I have to get my Olympic news on "American Idol" where the big buzz isn’t who’s getting voted off but that Ryan Seacrest is going to be an Olympic newscaster. When the U.S. Men’s National Team tied El Salvador in the Olympic qualifiers and thereby was eliminated from one of the 16 available Olympic berths, my first reaction was, "Why are they already doing the Olympic qualifiers?" I had this vague idea that the Olympics were still more than a year off.

Maybe I have been watching too much golf lately and have just missed the announcements of the Olympic qualifiers in other sports. Golf won’t enter the Olympics until 2016, so why would the Golf Channel tout the Olympics now? However I do also watch a fair amount of ESPN where I would think they would have a bit of enthusiasm for the events. Then there’s NBC, the home for the Olympics, who seems to be keeping their Olympic plans under wraps perhaps in hopes of a big reveal once new episodes of "The Office" are over. I had to read in the "Hollywood Reporter" that NBC is going to broadcast the Olympics in 3D. Is that actually Hollywood news? Maybe the naturally reticent personality of the British has affected the way the Olympics is being marketed – "Oh yes, old chap, that’s right. We are hosting the Olympics this year."

Before the last summer Olympics I already had a media guide I picked up at Dick’s Sporting Goods in November the year before. I had the date of Opening Ceremonies etched in my brain. I had already begun figuring out what I needed to DVR months prior to the actual broadcasts. The Olympics were a huge deal as news reports on the construction of the Bird’s Nest and how China was going to welcome its guests filled the national news. I couldn’t escape the Olympic preparations and announcements and now I can hardly find the Olympics on Google!

While I don’t condone spending your summer indoors watching TV, I do encourage young athletes to take in at least a few of the Olympic trials which are coming up soon. That’s why it’s so discouraging that publicity for these trials has been missing. Like the World Cup, athletes train and prepare for four years for the opportunity to represent their country in the Olympics. This is a capstone to their athletic lives. We fans should be able to keep ourselves well-informed and be able to watch the sports we love showcase their young amateur talent. I am betting that most young athletes have Olympic dreams. They need to see what effort it takes to achieve those dreams and hear about sacrifices and support. The Olympics are a venue for phenomenal achievement as well as crushing defeat. No one understands that better than the U.S. Men’s National Soccer team who has now broken a 15 Olympic appearance record.

In the spirit of the Olympics I want to provide my readers with the dates of some of the major trials. I’m certain at some point the channels carrying these trials will tout them as well, but I’d like to get the enthusiasm rolling early since I’d like to see the U.S. leaping into the competitions with strong support.

Track and Field June 21 – July 1

Swimming June 25 – July 2

Gymnastics June 28 – July 4

Wrestling April 21 – 22

Diving June 17 – June 24

For those of you who are wondering, Opening Ceremonies are July 27 and the Closing Ceremonies will be August 12. In between will be some of the best competition to be seen. So hopefully some programming executive somewhere will wake up and decide to hype this thing a bit more than it has been. Right now I wouldn’t mind a countdown or at least a whispered reminder.

The cornerstone of the player development model and the coaching methods advocated by US Youth Soccer and its members is the philosophy of The Game within the Child. The phrase was coined by Dr. Ron Quinn.

The idea that The Game within the Child is not so much about finding the right sport for a youngster as it is saying that the game, whatever game it may be, is already inside of each kid. So in time they find the sport that best suits them. Then the craft of coaching is to help the game come to the surface, so to speak. Let’s say a child is 7-years-old and plays soccer, baseball and basketball. Each of those games is already inside of the child, but to different degrees. The right sport environment and the right coach help the game come to the surface in the child and that game becomes part of the person. How much of each of the three sports is in that 7-year-old will vary from child to child. The sport that is best suited to the child and the sport to which the child is best suited usually comes out between the ages of 10 to 15 years old. So the kid plays all three sports when young, but narrows it down to one or two in the teenage years. The odds are that one of those sports the player excels at and the others not quite so much – well unless you were Deion Sanders.

Let’s say though in this case that soccer ends up being the number one sport for our youngster in question. The art of coaching would be for the coach to help a lot of soccer that is already in the person, to rise up and be honed. Fundamentally, the concept is that rather than force a sport into a child, let’s bring out the game that is already in there. How much of a particular game is in each child will vary individually. Even once the person chooses their number one sport the amount of the game in them, and thus the level in the game to which they will rise, varies with each person. They are not all destined to be professional players. Our final goal with all young players is to help the soccer within them come to the surface to the degree that they want to be involved with our sport for a lifetime.

It has become a tradition to find a beautiful and new outfit to celebrate not only Easter, but also the arrival of spring. We love to showcase our style and just feel good wearing new duds. Soccer players aren’t immune to wanting to flaunt some fancy threads and they are helped in this endeavor by the uniform manufacturers. Every company has built-in redundancy with all uniforms, which generally have a shelf life of three years before the style is retired. If you join a club in the final year of a uniform’s existence then you’ll find yourself making two full uniform purchases in one year.

I know parents want to make their soccer dollars stretch as far as possible, so they will often purchase uniforms a size larger with the hopes that the uniform will last a couple years. That’s a great idea so long as the club isn’t preparing to change uniforms that year. Spring is the season when clubs make that decision for the fall. Before you buy any new uniform, especially one too big, make sure the club isn’t going to switch in a couple of months. Most clubs would be happy to keep the same style forever. Uniforms are a way of identifying player attached to a club. And clubs understand that parents would rather not be buying entirely new kits every year or so. But their hands are tied because the manufacturers have figured out that only by retiring styles can they encourage clubs to outfit the entire crew in new gear.

It’s a good idea to find out when your club is going to switch to new styles. First of all it helps with your budgeting by letting you know that purchasing a full kit with warm-ups, jackets, and bags on the cusp of a uniform change could be very costly. Second, you should have some input to the switch. Most clubs are sensitive to how expensive all the extra gear can be, so they attempt to find uniforms that will go with past warm-ups. They will find gear bags that look similar to the older bags. But it’s a good idea for you to check and to suggest that your club try to stay as close to past gear as possible. Also clubs might not be mindful of their female players when choosing uniforms. Many white uniform jerseys can be too transparent for girls who are uncomfortable with their bras showing through. The cut of some shorts may not be appropriate for a girl’s figure. Therefore it’s not a bad idea to be sure that both the boys and the girls in the club try on samples of uniform choices and take part in the decision. Finally, clubs will do their players a great service if they have players of different heights and weights try on samples, especially of warm-ups, and record which size they selected based on these parameters. I’m sure you have all sat there with the uniform order form in your hands and agonized on sizes. Even better would be if the club could have samples in all sizes available for players to try on. Occasionally the venue that is supplying the uniforms will have samples that you can go to the store and try.

Even after getting new uniforms, the old ones don’t have to go to waste. Clubs could organize a sale where old uniforms are sold to the recreational teams in the club giving the rec teams the same club identification that the select teams have. Clubs should also provide a drop-off place for old uniforms, cleats and gear twice a year, and then take it to locations and organizations which collect the gear for both national and international youth teams. For example, US Soccer Federation sponsors the Passback program along with several corporate sponsors including Eurosport, who founded the program. US Youth Soccer partners with USSF to support Passback. You can also ask your State Association if they are sponsoring a collection of soccer equipment and coordinate your club’s collection to coincide. Another national organization is Peace Passers, an organization to which teams can ship gear free of charge. They provide you with the shipping partner to use. Also, check around your community to see if there are organizations in need of gently used soccer gear. Some churches have overseas programs where they outfit full youth teams and are looking for 18-21 uniforms of the same design. Someone in your club may have a relative serving in Afghanistan or other overseas locations and can distribute soccer equipment to youth players there. Likewise there may be a relative in the Peace Corps or on a mission who would be delighted to offer soccer uniforms to the children they work with. Encourage your club to have a designated board member for donations who can run a twice-yearly program to both collect and distribute the used uniforms, shin guards, cleats and balls that players no longer use.

We all love to dress up. Our young soccer players are no different. We know how much they love getting new uniforms, even as we lament having to open up the purse strings yet again. With a few safeguards, we can give our kids the new uniforms they love without breaking the bank and can set the club up as an outlet for donating the old ones. This spring’s renewal might show itself on the pitch next fall both in your town and, with your donations, around the world.

A few weeks ago I had the pleasure to visit the Hawaii Youth Soccer Association. While I was there I conducted a U6/U8 Youth Module, met with club directors of coaching, assisted with state trials for the US Youth Soccer Olympic Development Program and I met with the state association board of directors. During my visit I was able to interview George Kuntz the Technical Director for Hawaii Youth Soccer. I hope you enjoy our chat: